


As the Gentle Rain from Heaven

by ifitwasribald



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Gen, Non-Graphic Torture, Survival
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-07
Updated: 2012-07-07
Packaged: 2017-11-09 09:11:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,808
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/453813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ifitwasribald/pseuds/ifitwasribald
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>His condition makes him vulnerable, and her past makes her strong.  Both are capable of great bravery and great mercy.  They just don't know it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	As the Gentle Rain from Heaven

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to the anon!OP who prompted this on the Avengers kinkmeme!

Natasha is aware of concrete beneath her, heavy shackles, pain. The sound of breathing nearby--ragged, but steady. She waits. Her own breaths mock the slow rhythm of sleep, her eyes open imperceptibly. 

Time passes and people come and go. There are voices. Talk of weather, food, weapons, drugs, drinks, plans. Any job can be ordinary.

She shouldn’t be awake yet, but is. The long cold winter of her childhood more than prepared her for this. Chemicals don’t act in a vacuum. They depend on the thing they’re acting on, and she’s not what they expected.

It is hours before the ragged breathing shifts. Next to her, Banner carefully pulls himself to a seated position. Chains give a metallic rustle. Their captor is apparently a traditionalist.

Banner peers at her, and she allows her eyes to open further. Sits up herself. 

Each looks the other up and down, evaluating injuries, searching for clues of their predicament.

Banner is the first to speak. “You’re hurt.”

“You too.”

Banner looks surprised. He reviews his own body, slowly. The injuries aren’t serious, but they are obvious. Blood dries on his clothes. He nods. “I think that they gave me some kind of drug.” He speaks carefully.

Natasha nods in confirmation. “They injected you with something that they didn’t give me. It sounds like they think it will keep you from--” Natasha doesn’t finish. They both understand--saying it could only hurt. “Will it work?” Natasha isn’t sure which answer to hope for.

Banner laughs. The sound is familiar, bitter as the adrenaline in her throat. When he speaks, it’s quiet. “If it would, you don’t think I’d be on it already?”

Natasha doesn’t have an answer for that. For all the help that the Other Guy has been, for all the lives he’s saved, she supposes she always knew Banner would trade it in an instant to be relieved of the terrible responsibility. A part of her would like to blame him for that. But can’t.

Banner continues, slowly, still thinking this through. “Drugs aren’t any different than bullets. They might work on me, but they don’t work on him.” He pauses. “But if I'm drugged like this and he--” He looks upwards, like he’s trying to avoid her gaze. No, that isn’t it, she realizes. There are tears in his eyes, and he doesn't want to let them fall. “He’ll be like he used to be.”

Natasha understands. Swallows. Speaks with courage she doesn’t feel. “It doesn’t have to come to that.”

Banner nods tightly.

The door opens, flooding the room with the brighter light of the corridor. Three men and one woman enter, all equally grim, equally cautious. Natasha carefully allows fear to show as she watches them release Banner from the wall and remove him from the room. They are better than she had hoped. There are openings, but not good ones. Nothing she can be confident about.

They apparently haven’t taken Banner far, because the screaming begins almost immediately. Natasha grits her teeth and tells herself to ignore it. She studies the joints of her shackles (manageable, but they’ll take time to open), the placement of the door (yes, there is a blind spot, but an attack from it isn’t ideal), the chains leading to the wall (solid--too strong for her to break, but not strong enough to hold the Hulk for a minute). 

The truth is, she’s distracted. She wants to feel the throats of Banner’s tormentors in her grip--wants to smell their blood, to crack their ribs, to watch the light go out of their eyes. But she’s a professional, and she can work through this. She’s done it before. She knows that the worst isn’t over yet by a long shot. 

An hour passes. Maybe two. The screams are weaker, but they still cut right through her. She can feel them in her teeth. By the time she turns her attention to the cracks in the wall (useless, but at least there doesn’t seem to be a camera hiding anywhere), it isn’t just the torturers she wants to kill.

She’s felt this before--not clean hatred of the guilty, but twisted contempt for the weakness of the victim. It’s just, she tells herself, that she wouldn’t have pegged him for a coward. After all he’s been through, he could stand to have a backbone. She lashes out in a sudden move. There’s no target here but the wall, but it will do. 

She just needs him to shut the hell up, and there’s part of her that wants to do it for him.

She knows better, hates the contempt, the violence of her reaction. She hates herself for feeling it. But that’s a drop in a very large ocean, and she doesn’t have time to feel bad about it now.

She can’t help but think that the least he could do is let the Other Guy out. She wonders if her presence in the next room is the only reason he doesn’t, and and isn’t sure which answer would make her more furious.

The screaming ends in a whimper, and when Banner is dragged back into the cell a moment later, Natasha is surprised that he’s still conscious. Their captors have been careful. The wounds are mostly superficial--shallow cuts and more burn marks than bore thinking about--along with what look like some broken bones. It’s nothing he won’t survive.

He doesn’t speak at first. Just stares ahead.

“Are you ok?”

Bruce shakes his head. Then looks down, then shrugs, his mind apparently changed. “Yeah.”

“What did they ask you?”

A quiver runs through Bruce’s face, and disappears. “I don’t... really remember. A lot of things. They didn’t seem to care about the answers.”

That could mean anything. Feigning disinterest and simple sadism isn't a particularly effective interrogation technique, but a lot of people seem to think it is. Then again, some people really are just sick bastards.

There is a long silence before Natasha dares to speak again.

“If they-- if it happens again--” she pauses, not sure whether this will help or not, but it’s worth a try. “Try to just-- go away, somewhere in your head. Let things happen, but don't let yourself really feel them, like there’s a wall between you and your body. ” She isn’t explaining it well. She sounds like she thinks it’s easy, and she knows it’s not. But Banner--it’s like he’s got no walls at all. He screamed like he was paper thin. She has to try.

But Banner shakes his head. “Cat’s away, the mice will play,” he singsongs. But then he seems to realize how that sounds--unhinged, dangerous. He recovers himself, and tries again. “It’s different in my head. The part of me that’s, uh, me, can’t go away. I have to be there or the Other Guy--”

Oh. 

Shit. 

Natasha’s still a professional, but suddenly she’s nauseous. Most people, civilians even, could protect themselves at least a little. Could run away, for a precious moment, to some corner of their minds. And Bruce could do it too--better than almost anyone. But forced himself not to, every second. 

No wonder he screamed.

She just looks at him for a long moment. "Bruce, I'm--" She doesn't finish. "Sorry" is so ridiculously inadequate that the word dies in her throat.

He shakes his head anyway. "Don't." He looks at her like there's something else he wants to say. His eyes are dark, like a warning.

There’s a noise at the door, like it’s about to open again, and Bruce goes rigid. Moments pass and no one enters. Bruce doesn’t relax. 

She watches him appraisingly, and makes a decision. They won’t take him again.

“I need your help.”

His eyes light up for a second, and she wants to shoot herself for putting that look there. She doesn’t have a plan of escape. Just a plan of survival. She shakes her head slightly, and he nods, waits for her to explain.

“When they come again, you have to want,” she takes a deep breath, “you have to want them to take you again. To seem like it, I mean. They have to think that what you’re scared of is that they’re going to take me.”

Bruce looks at his hands. Doesn’t answer.

“Banner. Listen to me. I need you to do this.”

He looks up at her, meets her eyes. He understands, and she can see the relief and the guilt in his eyes before he looks back down at the floor.

She wants to soften this, to tell him he’s forgiven, to make none of it his fault. She does the best she can. “I’m sorry, but you need to listen. I am going to scream, and I am going to cry. And you are going to hear it all. But you have to know that it none of it will be real.” He probably knows that it’s a lie. But that’s ok. Sometimes a lie is good enough. “I’ve been through worse than they can do, and I’ve done worse than that.” He probably thinks that’s a lie too, but there’s no help for that now. “I just have to give them a show. And so do you.”

He’s let a couple of tears fall, and she doesn’t know if it’s from pain, or guilt, or fear. That’s ok too. She doesn’t need to know.

There are noises in the hallway again, and they brace themselves.

 

Natasha had a rabbit as a child. Not a pet as other children have pets. She didn't love it. But she knew it well, and she thinks of it now as she starts at the flood of light, presses herself back against the wall, away from the movement at the door. The rabbit trembled, and she learned to tremble too.

Out of the corner of her eye, Natasha watches as Bruce gives a challenging stare, asks for what he can’t possibly handle. He’s better than he has any right to be. As they drag her from the room, she tells herself that the horror in his face is part of the act too.

 

She does everything she promised Bruce she would do, and more. She cries, and screams, and begs, and spits defiance. She watches them carefully and gives them what they need to keep going. Bruce was right, the answers hardly matter to them. They’re here to break her, and she shows them how.

When they return her to the cell Bruce can’t meet her eyes, and it’s just as well, because she can’t meet his either.

 

They take her again, twice, three times. She gives good victim; she always has. And just like always, it gets her what she needs. They don’t take Bruce again.

They’re working on her when something goes wrong. They’re still good at their jobs, they stay calm. They don’t let up, but they’re worried. When they’re done, only two of them drag her back to the cell, and she knows that it’s now or never.

She’s so clumsy, far slower than she should be. Fighting them hurts more than letting them torture her had, and there’s a terrible moment when she thinks she’s going to lose, that they’re going to kill her right there, just inches out of Bruce’s reach. When it’s over their blood is everywhere, but she has their guns. More come, and then their blood is everywhere too.

Her vision is hazy with sweat and blood, some hers and some theirs. She can hear Bruce retching in the corner as she takes out three more.

The next four are harder. One gun is out of ammunition, and the bullets from the other just keep spinning back at her. These enemies are different. Larger, angrier, more fearsome. But some trick of the light makes it looks like one of them has tears on his face.

Bruce has recovered and is trying to get her attention. He can’t quite reach her, and she can’t afford to turn. One of their attackers gets close enough to grab her and she smashes his nose, whirling to kick at another, dancing back from their reach. 

And then she feels a hand on her ankle, looks down.

“Natasha,” Bruce is saying. “It’s ok. We’re ok. They’re--you _know_ them.” He is pleading, and it goes against every nerve in her body, but she has to listen. She looks up, and this time she sees them. Tony, and Steve, and Thor. And Clint, blood streaming from his nose, reaching out to embrace her, trying not to look hurt when she flinches away.

She drops the guns. Doesn’t move. Doesn’t know where to move to. Someone is sobbing and it’s her--of course it’s her. She reaches up and threads her fingers through her hair, and everything is sticky and everyone wants to be touching her, comforting her, and she just can’t. And then Bruce is there, free of the chains, and he’s touching her too, and she tries to find it in herself to do this one more thing for him and she can’t do that either. She drops to the ground, curling tightly around herself, and waits for the world to go black. Minutes later she feels a little stick, and gets her wish.

 

Natasha is aware of smooth sheets, a firm bed, the familiar light haze of painkillers. The sound of breathing nearby--calm and slow. She waits. Her own breaths mock the slow rhythm of sleep, her eyes open imperceptibly. 

Time passes and people come and go. There are voices. Mostly one voice. Talk of missions, medications, regrets, joy, shame, gratitude.

She shouldn’t be awake yet, but is. He’s talking to her anyway. She wonders if he can tell.

When he’s been quiet for a time, she opens her eyes properly, sits up in bed. Her whole body protests, but she ignores it. Bruce is in a chair next to the bed. “You look like hell,” she tells him. But it’s not really true. He’s bandaged and bruised, and his eyes are red, but his face is calm.

“You look like a warrior,” he tells her. He presses a gentle kiss against her temple and leaves.

“Thank you,” she whispers to the closed door.

 

She never tells him that she heard. And if he knows, he never tells her that either.

She doesn’t tell him that she understands. Doesn’t speak her admiration. She’s not really made that way.

She doesn't tell the others anything about what happened, and neither does he.

But in a quiet night over drinks, Clint casually tells Bruce that even Nick Fury has learned not to use the words “Bruce Banner” and “security risk” in the same sentence around the Widow.

And once on the battlefield she’s hurt, and the Hulk drops thirty-five stories to where she is, and the way he holds her is so tender that the others can only stare.

 

Months later they’re at a bar with the rest of the team--something they’re both a little more comfortable with now, each for their own reasons. 

It’s getting late when some twenty-something kid who's had a few beers too many recognizes Bruce. 

"The fuck you think you're doing here, freak?" He stands. He's tall. Looks down at Bruce. "I heard what happened in Harlem." He gives Bruce an experimental shove.

Bruce raises his hands, palms out. Doesn't want any trouble.

"Freak's a fucking coward," the kid crows to his friends. But when he turns back for another shove, Natasha’s there between them, grabs his wrist mid-shove and holds it. 

The kid clearly lacks even a shred of self preservation instinct, because he throws his head back and laughs. “And now the freak’s letting some chick--” He doesn’t get the opportunity to complete that old chestnut of a schoolyard taunt, because suddenly he’s up against a wall, and Natasha’s forearm is pressed so hard against his throat that he can barely breathe.

Natasha looks back over her shoulder and sees what she feared. The taunt’s landed like it never should have, and Bruce’s eyes are dark. The bar is quiet, the rest of the team watching along with everyone else.

“Take a good look at that man.” Her voice is low and dangerous, but it’s pitched to carry. “Because he’s the bravest human being you are ever going to lay your eyes on. And if you can’t tell the difference between cowardice and mercy--” she pauses, feels Bruce’s hand on her shoulder. Takes a breath and shakes her head. Her voice turns regretful. “Well, I guess we all make that mistake sometimes.” 

She releases the kid, and turns back to Bruce. She presses her lips against Bruce’s cheek, and when she speaks, it’s only to him. “But we should know better.”


End file.
